Officials said the process was fair, adding that complaints would be checked but did not undermine the overall vote.

Analysts believe the government wanted to rid parliament of its most vocal critics to ensure a trouble-free presidential election in 2011.

Mubarak, 82, has not announced if he will seek re-election and has no obvious successor. Many Egyptians believe his son Gamal, 46, will run if Mubarak, whose health has been under close scrutiny since he underwent gallbladder surgery in March, is unable to do so.

But analysts question whether Gamal has the popularity among the masses or the military support to take over.

Lack of genuine opposition

Hamid said most of the non-NDP seats would be taken by independents with links to the ruling party, and the genuine opposition was unlikely to take more than 1 per cent of seats.

The leftist Tagammu party will be the biggest opposition bloc in the new 518-seat assembly with five seats. Wafd won six seats but the party's status remains unclear as it has announced a boycott, indicating that its successful candidates will have to choose between staying in the party or parliament.

"The elections were full of widespread violations that brought Egypt at least 15 years back," said Egypt's Independent Coalition for Elections' Observation.

It said Mubarak should dissolve the new parliament and call fresh elections overseen by an independent judicial body to ensure minimum standards of transparency and fairness.

Although banned by a rule that outlaws religious parties, the Muslim Brotherhood fields candidates as independents. It said none of its candidates stood in the runoffs because of the boycott, although 26 had made it through the first round.

Despite the boycott, the state-run al-Ahram newspaper said one of the 26, Magdy Ashour, had won in a Cairo district. The Brotherhood denied he was standing.

"He has stuck by the Brotherhood's decision to boycott the second round of the elections which were rigged. We know nothing further," Brotherhood member Mohamed Mursi said.

Rights groups Amnesty International said as many as eight people died in election-related violence. A High Elections Commission official said there were four election-related deaths after the first round but no one died on the two voting days.